Sassy Seagull on The Tybee Tour of Homes!

Wow! It's been a long while since I've posted. Now that spring is here I am thrilled to think about tuning up our Tybee cottages for beach season!  I'm also super-excited to announce that our cottage, The Sassy Seagull is going to be on the 

Tybee Tour of Homes on May 5, 2018! 

We've been working hard to make it a fun time filled with lots of inspiration and great ideas for all of the tour patrons. We hope that you will come for a great day of touring and having lunch at Tybee! Click here for details about the tour, tickets and such...

My last post was a wrap up with pretty pictures of the vintage clawfoot tub bathroom reno at Sassy Seagull cottage. If you missed it and want to catch up, there is a link below plus a few "blast from the past" posts at The Sassy Seagull...

Clawfoot Tub Bathroom

Beach-y Master Bedroom

Quirky Little Kitchen

From Dive to Dining Room

Living Room--Welcome In!

I'll be back soon with some all new pictures and posts!

Now We're Cooking!

Last week I posted about all of the crazy quirks in the kitchen at Sassy Seagull and how we planned to remodel it. Let me pick up where we left off...

I chose basic white shaker cabinets--a style that suits this little cottage--simple 

and timeless.

I found these knobs and pulls at Home Depot. I liked the aged, galvanized look and felt it had the feel I was trying to capture in this vintage cottage.

I used Wilsonart laminate countertops in Designer White...not fancy or luxurious (which fits in with with the down home feel of these quaint old Tybee cottages) but 

very budget-friendly!

Once these elements were in place we stained the floors, installed the sink and the appliances, and painted the walls with Martha Stewart Living's 

"Glass of Milk" in semi-gloss. I also had some pretty blue penny tiles installed as a backsplash.

Here's a closeup of the tile...

SomerTile FXLMPML Retro Penni Matte Light Porcelain Floor and Wall Tile

Last but not least, we had some leftover boards that were ripped down from some of the walls in the cottage to allow for wiring and plumbing to be updated so we decided to salvage them and reuse them by cladding the peninsula with them.  They add such a fun touch to the room! And they were free!

So here's the kitchen...

I used curtains in the window that pick up the orange of the stools. They are not pictured here because they were installed after I took these photos. This is the fabric...

P. Kaufmann Indoor/Outdoor Coral Splendor Stripe fabric

A few more photos...

And that's how we went from this...

To this...

SaveSave

A Quirky Kitchen

Have you ever played "What's Wrong With This Picture?"  Well, take a look at these "before" photos of the kitchen at Sassy Seagull cottage and let's play!

What's wrong with this kitchen?

Some of the things that stand out to me are (1) the countertop and cabinet end at a window (2) there is a electrical panel box next to the upper cabinet which violates code and  (3) the overall look says "tired".

Here's another view of the room...What else do you see?

At first I wondered if an appliance was missing at the end of the counter to the right of the sink but then I realized there was a gap there because of the closet door. And although it is not obvious from these photos, the floors were buckling and we suspected (correctly) that there were structural issues to deal with.

So these were on our to-do list:

(1) Gut the kitchen

(2) Repair the structural issues to shore up the floor joists. 

(3)Relocate the electrical panel to the new laundry/utility room.

(4) Close up the window on the left side of the room so the base and upper cabinets could run all the way across to the wall. This was a tough call but having cabinets won out. We compensated by replacing the center window with a slightly larger one.

(5) Replace the flooring with wood floors and clad the walls with paneling to match the rest of the house.

(6) Add pulldown attic stairs so that access could be available to the attic for storage and for servicing the systems such as HVAC, wiring, plumbing. The stairs were added in the walkway that goes through the periphery of the kitchen and not in the work area. You can see just a bit of them in the ceiling on the right.

(7) Close up one of the closets on the right side of the wall so that the counter and cabinets can run all the way across without obstruction. As the next photos show, the lost closet space was recovered on the living room side of the wall as a built-in bookshelf.

Looking from kitchen side through to the living room before the wall is closed up.

The roughed-in bookshelf

The finished bookshelf in the living room.

(8) Turn one of the other closets into a built-in pantry/storage area with shelving.

 (9) Add a peninsula for additional workspace, storage, and seating.  Here's a not-to-scale hand drawing of the plan.

Next week I'll show you how it all turned out!

This Kitchen Gets Some Bling!

When I left you last time our kitchen was almost completed.  All we were lacking was a pantry which John Lindsay from Catskill Builders built to fit the space we had available.

You can see the pantry against the wall looking slightly rustic--just the way we want it.  But if you look closely you'll see something is not quite right yet...

This kitchen needs some bling!  I always think of the knobs as being like the jewelry accessorizing an outfit.  Budget had to be considered so I chose inexpensive pulls for the cabinet doors and splurged a little on the drawer knobs.

I found some great candidates.  Looky, looky!

Here are the sources for the hardware starting with the top row going left to right and 

working down.  I found most of them and many more at knobs.com which has a huge selection of knobs with beach and nautical themes.

1.  Hickory Hardware rectangular cabinet pull from Lowes  $4.39

2.  Liberty 2 3/4 in. Newton cabinet pull from Home Depot  $1.78

3. Siro Designs Ocean Line Collection bright chrome starfish knob  $7.51

4. Cal Crystal Artx Glass knob.  Comes in several colors ad finishes.  I chose Marine Blue (more turquoise than the knob shown) and polished nickel  $11.76

5.  Liberty Seaside Cottage turtle knob in vintage antique white  $2.86

6.  Liberty Seaside Cottage Starfish knob in vintage antique white  $2.86

7.  Novelty Hardware Tropical Collection Large Seahorse facing right--many finishes available.  My favorite was nickel  $13.68

8.  Novelty Hardware Tropical Collection Large Seahorse facing left  $13.68

This was my edited list of candidates.  There were so many great knobs to choose from.  The Liberty Seaside Cottage collection was huge and temptingly affordable!  So what did I choose?

I decided to use the bright chrome Starfish knobs from Siro for the nine drawers in the kitchen.  

 

For the cabinets I preferred the Hickory Hardware pulls from Lowes but since I splurged on the drawer pulls, I chose the inexpensive Liberty Newton cabinet pulls that were in stock at Home Depot.  They look fine!

Then for the pantry doors I couldn't resist the seahorses that face each other.  I chose the nickel finish which is brighter than the picture shown below.  Here's one seahorse...

After a marathon shopping trip to furnish the kitchen with dishes, appliances, pots and pans, etc. and it's hardware finery installed, the kitchen is finally all decked out and ready for a party!

The first holiday celebrated at Doc Holiday was Independence Day!  Simple decoration--3 flags in vases.  Gotta make do.

My daughter Meghan painted the corkboard with the chevron pattern as a Mother's Day gift for me!

Come on over!

Now We're Cooking!

It amazes me to watch a kitchen remodel--so many steps to get to the grand finale.  I was thankful to have the help of expert kitchen designer, Donna Lodge, to help me with my kitchen plan using the stock cabinets that I purchased while they were on a sale at Lowes.  It was not easy to make the plan because at the time of planning the kitchen, it was being demo-ed and the ceiling slopes quite a bit.

Once the drywall was ready, Catskill Builders began to set the cabinets in place.

Making sure everything is level before bringing in the countertops

The refrigerator is the old one that was left behind by the previous owners.  It has been sitting in the house the whole time and now it has a temporary place to fit in.

This is the spot where the stove will slide in and the microwave/vent above it.

There were no pretty wood walls to give texture to this space and everything in the kitchen looked so white to me so I decided to paint the walls Buoyant Blue, the Sherwin Williams paint color I had loved so much at The Coral Cottage.  It seemed to play well with others when placed with other colors so that was that.

Don't the floors look pretty?  We used Allure plank flooring in Antique Elm--a budget decision since hardwood flooring was out of range.  But I've used it at two other cottages in other colors and been very pleased.

Then it was time for counter tops.  I was under the pressure of a deadline--since we expected to host family in a couple weeks.  I needed to watch my budget so we went with formica-type counters.  No time for special orders so I went with good ole white with a rounded edge that rolled all the way under.  I've found that counters that have that rolled edge that leaves no MDF exposed underneath hold up better and don't warp so badly when steamy dishwashers are being used.

The appliances were delivered and placed--the refrigerator needed to be centered but as you can see we also have the dishwasher and the range and microwave.  Now we're cookin!

All that's left is to build a little pantry and look for the drawer and cabinet handles.  Can't wait to show you what we used for the drawer pulls!

Doc Holiday Gets Some 9-1-1!

As I sit down to type up my blog post this evening, there is a huge thunderstorm going on outside--just like the ones I remember from growing up in Savannah.  I like a good thunderstorm!  And the ones at Tybee usually hit hard, rain like crazy, and then pass quickly.  

It's so nice to be safe and cozy inside at Doc Holiday with the man who inspired the cottage's name!  Henry and I are enjoying a "just the two of us" weekend here at Tybee!  Let me take a few minutes to show you what happened to the kitchen once the demolition phase was over.

When all the walls were taken down to the studs, we discovered a former door and window that had been covered over.  The door was in a much better location so we decided to use it and close up the old door.  The window was framed out to connect to the dining room where we could have a bar with bar stools for additional eating space.

We also got our wiring...

and our plumber paid us a call to do the rough-in.

No, the pipe was not left going up so high--this was where the kitchen sink was going to be located.  I just didn't want you to miss it :-)

 Once all the needful but not-so-pretty things were installed the drywall was hung.

Now that is pretty!

Have a good weekend y'all!  I'm going to go have a good weekend too!